Patrick Maloney, Elena Sava, and Laura McDonald Tsunamis in Japan The island nation of Japan is located on the edge of a multitude of tectonic plates. The southern half of the nation of Japan is located on the eastern edge of the Eurasian plate while the northern half is situated on the North American plate. To the West of each of these sit both the Pacific and Philippine plates. Both the Philippine and Pacific plates of are moving westward, as they subduct beneath the Eurasian plate and North American plates respectively. 1 The seismic activity of these plates, coupled with volcanic activity from subduction zones have caused multiple tsunamis that have produced a large number of casualties. Major and Recent Tsunamis The tsunami on March 11 th 2011 was the most recent Tsunami in Japan. Triggered by a 9.0 magnitude earthquake 1 http://blogs.agu.org/wildwildscience/2011/03/11/super- quake-spawns-massive-tsunami-in-japan/
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Patrick Maloney, Elena Sava, and Laura McDonald
Tsunamis in Japan
The island nation of Japan is located on the edge of a multitude of tectonic
plates. The southern half of the nation of Japan is located on the eastern edge of the
Eurasian plate while the northern half is situated on the North American plate. To
the West of each of these sit both the Pacific and Philippine plates. Both the
Philippine and Pacific plates of are moving westward, as they subduct beneath the
Eurasian plate and North American plates respectively.1 The seismic activity of
these plates, coupled with volcanic activity from subduction zones have caused
multiple tsunamis that have produced a large number of casualties.
Major and Recent Tsunamis
The tsunami on March 11th 2011 was the most recent Tsunami in Japan.
Triggered by a 9.0 magnitude earthquake that struck off the shore of Honshu, Japan,
this earthquake was the strongest to ever hit Japan in recorded history. The
earrthquake shook the ground around 2:46 PM and shortly after resulted in the
creation of a destructive tsunami. The highest run-up in the ocean was measured
38.9 meters in height.2 The highest tsunami height was 7.3 meters at Soma.
Following these maximums, there were heights of 4.2 and 4.1 in Oarai and Kamaishi
Japan.3 The tsunami was a devastating disaster that caused 15,826 deaths, 5,942